


Rehearsal

by glowinggreeneyes



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Actor Dean Winchester, Bisexual Dean Winchester, Coming Out, First Kiss, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, HS AU, M/M, Smut Mention, Teen Destiel, The Normal Heart, i hate the ending but oh well, tumblr import
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 14:36:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6989266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glowinggreeneyes/pseuds/glowinggreeneyes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean asks Cas to ask him out with a few lines for his big showcase performance, and both struggle to not relate with the words until it gets too much. Too close.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rehearsal

He crossed his legs. Somehow that felt uncomfortable sitting in the middle of the bed where a fortress of fluffed up pillows Dean normally had were absent. So he uncrossed his legs and brought them up to his chest, which didn’t work either.

Every time he thought he heard Dean come near the door, his stomach did flips, butterflies rippling from his chest to his abdomen. Maybe he was just edgy tonight; this normally happened around his friend but slowly Castiel was questioning how much of a ‘friend’ he mutually felt with Dean. There was less doubt to his feelings now the physical effects of crushing began to tailor his every movement around the guy.

Cas shuffled again. Jeez, he really needed to bury this to the bottom of the closet under floorboards in a basement below and abandoned, post-apocalyptic house. That sure would be helpful.

Unfortunately that wasn’t going away any time soon and there was always that looming sense of a stupid action on Cas’ part was impending - like blurting out his feelings, or letting slip an alluding statement, or worse, kissing him. And that surely meant terminating their friendship. Good one, Cas.

This time, when Cas felt the wobble in his heart, the door actually opened to reveal a damp Dean. Damp as in he’d just come out of the shower and slipped into dark shorts but still wet enough to have a towel to try and dry himself; he ruffled his hair as he stepped through and Cas had to avert his eyes.

“You can relax, y’know,” Dean mumbled, shutting the door with the heel of his foot. “You’ve practically lived here for half your life, whats got into you?”

“N-Nothing,” Cas lied. “Just lost in thought.”

“Yeah well you look like you’ve just caught our gym teacher and your brother going at it in the janitors closet - highly disturbed at the scarring sight, yet expecting it.”

Cas let out a soft chuckle, still looking away from his friends charming, killer smile and bright green eyes- _no Cas stop, for you own good. Save yourself the heartbreak._

“I’m not sure what to reply apart from complementing your imagination…” then he grimaced, “actually, I regret that word choice…don’t say anything about my older siblings having sex ever again.”

He felt the bed dip in front of him, so had no choice but to glance up. Okay, it wasn’t a glance, more of an ogle because Cas does that to Dean now.

When he looked up Dean was slumping over his knees, legs dangling off the bed and giving Cas the ladykiller grin. Oh God, and he wasn’t wearing anything but shorts…Cas did not have it that bad.

A fleeting look down to Dean’s shorts and Cas discovered he had it worse than first thought.

“You can tell me anything, Cas, seriously. Been friends for years, man.” _8 years_ , Cas mentally corrected him.

“It’s nothing you can do anything about.” He shied away from Dean’s stare.

“Alright, dude, but if there is, let me know.”

There was an awkward silence between them - only awkward because they were hooked onto a fixated study of one another; normally it was comfortable but Cas feared Dean knew about his infatuation, consequently making the whole situation exacerbated to a whole new level.

Nevertheless, Cas felt a flush of amore come over his cheeks. “I’m…I’m going to help you with your lines now.”

“Ugh, you’re no fun when it comes to secrets,” Dean groaned mockingly. Then, with his eyes still raised at Cas, he flopped over to the side to reach his desk and grabbed his script.

Cas took the chunk of paper containing _The Normal Heart_ , of which Dean had nervously confessed over text to performing one scene from for an exhibition night (of talent and writers, mainly, but some for entertainment) at the Theatre Palace, which housed around 3,000 people. And Dean, although trying to hide it, had never been more scared.

Cas glanced at the title he knew too well. “This is heavy stuff for a 17 year old to perform.”

“I’m only doing scene 5,” Dean dismissively said, expecting Cas to know what that entailed.

While Cas was flicking through to find the pages, he processed what Dean was saying. “I wish you’d just accept your intellect and genius, your interest in subjects such as this. And you’re not even gay.”

“Pfft. Firstly, that doesn’t mean I couldn’t read it and be really interested in this sort of subject, and secondly: how do you know I’m not?”

He could tell Dean was staring at him. “Not? Not what?”

“Gay?”

Cas rest the script in his lap, thumb bookmarking scene 5. The gentle turn of his head made the mood all the more somber. “Because when have you shown interest in men?”

Dean’s mouth seemed to hang agape for a moment, not expecting that answer, but then his mouth ran away from him, spilling words he hadn’t meant. “When I comment ‘oh, he’s hot’ o-or wink at male bartenders, or have a not-so-secret stash of porn mags…with men. That’s when.”

“Dean, are you…?”

“Cas, I’m not gay, I’m…I’m bi,” he almost whispered.

Cas swallowed hard. Now, he could’ve said many things, most notably along the lines of ‘thanks for telling me’ or another comforting, accepting phrase. Unfortunately Cas’ brain wasn’t exactly functioning as “Good” was all that came out of his mouth.

“Wh-What-?”

Quickly realising his mistake, Cas fumbled to recover the unrecoverable. “I-I meant good for you for…coming to terms with your attraction…and just know that I’m here as your best friend and fellow in queer arms.” Cas mentally face-palmed.

After a moment of consideration for Cas’ words, Dean found some more words to say. “Thanks, Cas. I knew you’d accept me but…when to tell was the bigger question.”

“Now is as good of a time as ever,” shrugged Cas.

“I just needed to tell you but can we not make this about sexuality and move on to plot?”

“O-Of course,” Cas scrabbled with finding the page again and sat back against the wall so Dean wouldn’t be able to cheat. “Where from?”

“I’ve got the first half nailed, just need, from, uh, ‘Boy, I think I’ve found myself a real live weird one’.”

Cas’ eyes scanned the page to find it and eventually came across the lines. “So, you’re Ned?”

“Yep. And you’re Felix.”

“Isn’t he the one that-”

“Shh! Spoilers,” Dean grinned, one finger coming up to cover Cas’ lips.

Cas shuffled to get more comfortable before clearing his throat. He watched Dean do the same, getting into character, before beginning. “Boy, I think I’ve found myself a real live weird one. I had no idea.” The script instructed his pause, and like every other time they’d read scripts together and Dean pointed out that _it quite clearly says pause_ , he paused. “Hey, I just called you weird.”

Dean let out a small chortle. “You are not the first.”

“You’ve never had a lover, have you?”

He tilted his head to look at Cas, all the expression of a cheeky but refined Ned coming out in the cocked eyebrow and small smirk. “Where did you get that from?”

“Have you? Wow.”

“I suppose you’ve had quite a few.”

“I had a very good one for a number of years, thank you. He was older than I was and he found someone younger.”

“So you like them older. You looking for a father?”

Cas had to stop himself laughing at those words coming from Dean’s mouth, but he stayed in character as to not break the spell as it were.

“No, I am not looking for a father! God, you are relentless. And as cheery as Typhoid Mary.”

Cas then glanced over the next lines and coughed.

“Uh, it says you come over and sit beside me- I mean Felix. And then…we kiss intensely.”

“We, uh…we don’t have to do that part if you don’t want to.”

“You’ll have to do it with whoever you’re acting with though, Dean, there’s no escaping this.”

Darkening pink spread across Dean’s cheeks at the thought, his eyes widening. “Y-Yeah, and to think they’ll be my first kiss with a guy will be with him.”

The thought of this happening made Cas’ stomach churn, he felt sick at the thought of someone else kissing Dean, let alone another guy that wasn’t him. He couldn’t be with Dean, and he’d accepted that, but it didn’t stop him from pining.

“Can you remind me of the next line…I can’t remember what it is after there?” Dean asked, snapping Cas out of his thought process.

Cas hurriedly searched for the next line after losing his place on the page. “It’s…The American Jews knew exactly what was happening… think you can pick it up from there?”

Dean scrunched his face for a moment before seemingly recollecting it. “The American Jews knew exactly what was happening, but everything was downplayed and stifled. Can you imagine how effective it would have been if every Jew in America had marched on Washington? Proudly! Who says I want a lover? Huh!? I mean, why doesn’t anybody believe me when I say I do not want a lover?”

“You are fucking crazy. Jews, Dachau, Final Solution — what kind of date is this! I don’t believe anyone in the whole wide world doesn’t want to be loved…

“Ned, you don’t remember me, do you? We’ve been in bed together. We made love. We talked. We kissed. We cuddled. We made love again. I keep waiting for you to remember, something, anything. But you don’t!” Cas couldn’t believe those words were coming out of this mouth, but it was the only time he figured he would ever say those words to Dean which kinda made him excited, kinda also indisposed.

“How could I not remember you?”

“I don’t know.”

Dean seemed to stumble for a moment before Cas mouthed the word ‘maybe’ hoping Dean would catch on. “Maybe if I saw you.”

“It’s okay, as long as we treat each other like whores. It was at the baths a few years ago. You were busy cruising some blond number and I stood outside your door waiting for you to come back and when you did you gave me such an inspection up and down you would have thought I was applying for the CIA.”

“And then what?” Dean leaned forward with a small grin on his face. Cas mirrored his actions.

“I just told you. We made love _twice_. I thought it was lovely. You told me your name was Ned, that when you were a child you read a Philip Barry play called Holiday where there was a Ned, and you immediately switched from … Alexander? I teased you for taking such a Wasp, up-in-Connecticut-for-the-weekend-name, and I asked what you did, and you answered something like you’d tried a number of things, and I asked you if that had included love, which is when you said you had to get up early in the morning.

“That’s when I left. But I tossed you my favourite go-fuck-yourself yourself when you told me ‘I really am not in the market for a lover’ — men do not just naturally not love — they learn not to. I am not a whore. I just sometimes make mistakes and look for love in the wrong places. And I think you’re a bluffer. Your novel was all about a man desperate for love and a relationship, in a world filled with nothing but casual sex.”

Cas seemed to spill all the words out fluidly, as if the words came out of his own imagination. He had to take a pause out of the huge chunk of text, but it seemed natural for the scene for them to just stare at each other, lose themselves in the moment of words swimming inside their minds.

Subconsciously, they edged closer, still holding each others gaze, drawing in like a force was pulling them closer.

“Do…do you think we could start over?” Dean sadly said, looking up through hooded eyelids and thick lashes still dark and rinsed from the shower.

Then Cas, lost in the moment and the irresistibility of Dean’s lips at that moment; in that second he couldn’t care less if Dean hated him. He just edged forward, then whispered the final line of the scene, “Maybe.”

The gap closed between them, soft lips pressing together. Languid movements drove their kiss on; oh, and it was warm and soft like velvet, slow with tongues dipping and lips caressing, heads tilting.

Cas just felt the anxious but excited buzzing in his chest; unfortunately his idea of heaven was cut short by Dean suddenly stilling against him. However surprised he was for Dean kissing him, he was even more surprised at him stopping: it was a damn good kiss.

He opened his eyes and watched Dean’s shocked expression move away from him. Dean stood up sharply and turned his back to Cas. Oh fuck, how Cas thought he’d ruined everything.

“Oh my God I am so…shit, I’m sorry.”

“Cas,” Dean breathed, scratching though his hair.

“Actually I’m not sorry for what it meant on my part…but I’m sorry I did so without consent or-or prior warning and I’ve completely derailed our friendship so…”

“Damn straight.”

“Damn gay,” Cas found himself replying.

At that, Dean found himself collapsing into a fit of laughter. “I didn’t think you liked me,” he managed to get out between his fading chuckles.

“You’re every mans wet dream, Dean, and you have a dazzling personality of which I couldn’t help but fall for… Did I overdo it on the campness?”

“Yeah, just a smidgen,” Dean smirked. “The only reason I knew for certain I liked guys was because of my crush on you,” he began, sitting back next to Cas.

Cas felt himself tense, a blush rising up his neck and across his cheeks. He bit his lip, trying to find something to say. “You…have a crush…on me? How sweet.”

“Cut it, wise mouth.” Dean shrugged it off.

“I can do a lot of things with my mouth,” murmured Cas, a smirk playing on his full lips.

“Yeah, well you could’ve told me you liked me and saved a few months of hellish confusion.”

“Months? Winchester, I am flattered-” before Cas could go on, Dean surged forward and cupped his jaw. This kiss only lasted a few seconds but Dean drew it out as he pulled gently away.

Cas realised his eyes were still closed and thinned his lips, ducking away from Dean’s gaze when he opened them again. Only soft eyes greeted him (and a hand joined with his).

“Cas, can you sleep next to me tonight?”

“Yes.”

“Is this whole thing what you were nervous about earlier?”

“…Yes.”

“Well it looks like we’re just a couple of dumbasses.”

“It would seem that way,” Cas replied.


End file.
